Volunteers bring bountiful gifts to Marine family

By: JOHN RAIFSNIDER - For the North County Times | Saturday, December 22, 2007 9:27 PM PST ∞

OCEANSIDE - Minutes before 30 volunteers with the North County Warriors Support Group walked through his door with gifts galore for him and his family, David Lind, a career military man, was saying everything that a modest and humble senior enlisted Marine would say.

"This shouldn't be happening to us, they should be doing this for another, more deserving family," said Lind, who lost his lower legs to a roadside bomb in Iraq last summer.

"I'm overwhelmed - this can't be happening," he said Saturday, as more strangers walked into his Oceanside home with a fully prepared ham dinner for his family, a Christmas tree with all the trimmings, and dozens of gifts for Lind, 36, his wife, Lisa, 35, and their 6-year-old son, Keith.


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The Lind family had been told that the group was bringing them a prepared Christmas dinner, but not about the many other gifts.

"We're going to show up with 30 people, and then we're going to give them the news," said Brian Cook, one of the volunteers, before the group arrived at the Lind home.

"We're going to tell them, we've got good news and bad news. The good news is we have everything you could ask for and more. The bad news is, that we weren't able to spend all the money, and we're going to give you a check for $1,500 dollars."

Lisa Lind said she was notified about the visit and the meal, but knew nothing else of the group's plans for her family.

"We have no idea how they even came up with our name," she said. "We received a call explaining that our family had been chosen for adoption this Christmas, but we didn't really know what all that meant. We tried to get them to adopt another family, but they insisted that it be us."

Support group co-founder Sue Gierster said the Linds are one of two Marine families that the 75-member nonprofit group selected to adopt after their names were submitted anonymously.

"Someone who knows both the families made the suggestion to us that we work with these two families," Gierster said.

Gierster and her husband, Jack, started the support group in 2003 after hearing a San Diego radio talk-show host tout Operation Homefront over the airwaves. Part of that program included fixing the vehicles of military spouses while their husbands were away at war.

The main function of the support group, according to Cook, is to repair the cars of young military families.

"So far, we've done over $130,000 worth of work on the cars of low-ranking military members," Cook said.

The outpouring of gifts seemed to change the opinion of Lind family friend John Robinson, a guest who said that before Saturday, he didn't put much stock in Christmas and its trappings.

"We didn't really do Christmas when I was growing up," said Robinson. "Christmas has never really been that big of a deal to me before, but this changed my opinion. I think it is pretty awesome."

Robinson, a former Marine who grew up in San Diego, said he felt the military was often overlooked around the holidays.

"The simple fact is that it is easy to assume that nobody really cares, especially for we Marines," he said.

"So it's really nice to see when people appreciate what Marines do. This is 40 steps beyond seeing someone just hang a flag on their door. I've never seen anything like this before. It's just awesome."

Among the gifts specifically for David Lind, a double amputee who serves with 1st Reconnaissance Battalion, was a Pittsburgh Steelers helmet autographed by current players Hines Wards and Troy Polamalu.

"This is fantastic - oh, my goodness," David Lind said. "I had no idea this was going to happen. It is unbelievable. This is just crazy."

On June 14, Lind lost both his legs when a roadside bomb tore through the Humvee he was riding in while on patrol in Iraq's Anbar province. Lind was fitted with prosthetics and returned to Camp Pendleton on July 28. He was promoted to master sergeant in November and is set to retire in summer 2009.

As the gifts continued to flow into their home, David and Lisa Lind shook their heads in disbelief.

"I'm overwhelmed," he said. "This does not make sense, this isn't happening. You guys are amazing and words can't begin to describe how I feel right now. It's totally magical."

The support group's treasurer, Brooks Deegan, interrupted the gift train long enough to present David Lind with a framed certificate and thanked the family for their service to the country.

"Military families are very important to us," Brooks told the Linds. "The reason we do this is because of families like yours, and gentlemen like you are out there every day keeping our country safe."

A teary-eyed David Lind accepted the certificate and told the group: "This exceeds anything that we could have ever imagined. This is totally and completely humbling."

He said the certificate will hang on his wall "as long as I have a wall to hang it on."

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